Recently, communication between computer systems for data and information exchange has been significantly developing thanks to the Internet, which is known to have rapidly spread on a global level by virtue of being supported by public communication networks, both traditional and technologically advanced ones, such as ISDN, ADSL, GPRS, and others.
Success of this phenomenon is indeed due, also, to the availability, in real time and cheaply, of information and data stored on servers located all over the globe and connected through dedicated digital lines to computers reachable through the various last mile network access services.
As regards the cheapness of operations practicable on the net, it has to be considered that it is directly bound to the cost of the access connection between the user's computer and the access point to the net. More exactly, the network access points are identified, for example by telephone numbers which are made available to the users by each Internet Service Provider (ISP), in order to allow the connection to the provider computers, which are part of the network. As it is known, they store all users' identification data and offer services such as electronic mail, access to sites of the net by assisted, or not, research procedures, memory spaces where each user can put data, commercial news or other information news visible to all users of the net, and more other services.
Thanks to the quality and variety of these services, and also to growing variety of technical tools for access to the net, such as computers, advanced means interfacing TV sets, mobile telephone apparatuses, etc., the number of Internet users has been rapidly increasing. Therefore, it is easily understandable how it can become important to get fast connections to the net through affordable access points, that is, points included in the user's telephone district or area, or in very near areas.
In order to better understand the above difficulties, it has to be considered that according to current connection modalities the user has to choose a specific Internet Service Provider identifying the user according to specific identification data, said Internet Service Provider being associated to an access number, for example a telephone number, stored in memory means of the user's connecting apparatuses to the net. This access number must expediently coincide with the provider's nearest access points to the place where the connecting apparatuses are.
FIG. 1 illustrates schematically the accessing of data on Internet network 100, a distributed computing network environment. The participants in the Internet are a wide variety of machines, organizations, and individuals, all able to communicate and share information. For example, the Internet network 100 includes a plurality of Internet sites 105-1 to 105-q. These Internet sites are generally operated by corporations, universities, and governmental organizations. Each Internet site may include one or more repositories of information and resources that may be accessed over the Internet. Each Internet site, e.g., 105-1 and 105-q, may include a plurality of WEB servers e.g., 110-1 to 110-r and 110′-1 to 110′-n, respectively. Each of these WEB servers may provide a “home page” to be visited, files to be read or downloaded, applications to be shared, and the like.
The Internet network 100 also includes a plurality of points of presence (POPs) 115-1 to 115-s that are operated by Internet service providers (ISPs). These ISPs are in the business of providing Internet access to end-user stations, generically referred to as 120. As mentioned above, the costs of the telephone connection between a user's computer and the access point to the net represent an important part of the Internet connection costs and thus, the geographical locations and distributions of the POPs 115-1 to 115-s are important. For sake of illustration, it is assumed that POPs 115-1 to 115-3 belong to a first geographical location, referred to as 125-1, and POP 115-s belongs to a second geographical location, referred to as 125-2.
As it is apparent from FIG. 1, two problems may arise when a user needs to set a connection with the ISP the user has a supplying contract with. Firstly, if the POP of the ISP is located in the second geographical location 125-2 while the user is momentarily located in the first geographical location 125-1, the communication costs between the user and the point of presence may be prohibitive. Secondly, if the closest POP is over-busy, the user must choose another POP, farther away, which increases communication costs. For example, if POPs 115-3 and 115-s belong to a same ISP and the user is located in the first geographical location 125-1, the user may be forced to set its connection with POP 115-s when POP 115-3 is over-busy. This case may arise even though POPs 115-1 and 115-2 are not over-busy since these POPs may belong to other ISPs.
Likewise, the subscribers of ISPs that do not have enough POPs may experience difficulties establishing connections.
These problems may be avoided by improving geographical distribution of POPs and increasing the number of POPs for each ISP. However, this is not realistic due to the required expenses. As a result, there is a need for a method and systems for sharing points of presence between Internet service providers.